School bus trial aims to save children’s lives

Saving the lives of
school children is the aim of a national trial launched in
Ashburton today (Wednesday 28 August) to get motorists to
slow down when passing a school bus stopped to let children
on or off.

Thirty school buses in Mid Canterbury have been
fitted front and back with flashing 20km/h signs - the legal
speed limit when passing a stationary school bus - to get
drivers to slow down.

The NZ Transport Agency’s Southern
Regional Director Jim Harland says 23 school children have
been killed in New Zealand during the last 25 years when
crossing the road to or from school buses, and another 47
have been seriously injured.

“A perception survey in
July of 700 Mid Canterbury motorists found 40% of drivers
said they did not slow down to 20km/h past school buses that
have stopped to pick up or drop off children. The survey
also found that 35 per cent of drivers did not even know
that 20km/h was the legal speed limit.”

Data collected
to date as part of the trial shows that most motorists are
speeding past school buses, with bus drivers reporting
“less than one in 20 slows down past a school bus”.

The trial is being run by Transport Engineering Research
New Zealand (TERNZ) with funding from the Road Safety Trust
(NZ Transport Agency), and supported by the local police,
Ashburton District Council and Rural Women New Zealand.

Mr
Harland says the aim of the trial is to educate motorists on
the 20km/h speed limit. “The Either way it’s 20k
campaign has been running in Ashburton for the last two
months, raising awareness of the legal speed limit and the
need to slow down.”

The illuminated 20km/h signs with
flashing beacons have been fitted on 30 buses operated by
Pearsons Coachlines. The company has the contract for 27
school bus runs from the Rangitata to Rakaia, bringing
children to schools within the town and outlying rural
areas.

Pearsons Coachlines Depot Manager Mark Cook says
while driving school buses he has seen a lot of close calls
- “a lot of which never get reported” - and has
witnessed motorists passing stationary school buses on long,
straight roads at speeds in excess of 100km/h.

“We were
very motivated when the opportunity arose to join with Rural
Women New Zealand, with a vision to improve the safety of
our children around school buses. The results so far have
been extremely positive and now combined with the new 20km/h
signs on the buses, I am sure that the current trial will
prove to be successful.”

For local resident, Maureen
Maginness of Rural Women New Zealand, an incident involving
her own children when they were young, has resulted in a
lifetime commitment to improving road safety for school
children.

She is a strong advocate for getting a reduction
in speeds past stationery school buses, saying if the trial
enables us to “just save one child from an injury or
death, then we would have done a wonderful
thing”.

Ashburton Mayor Angus McKay says it is great
Ashburton had been chosen for the trial and he welcomed the
opportunity to work with the partners to make it a
success.

“Nothing is worse than the life of a child
being lost, particularly in circumstances that could have
been avoided if someone had simply observed the legal speed
limit and slowed down.

“I hope the trial is a huge
success and as a result the flashing school bus signs are
rolled out across the country to support road safety and
save the lives of our children.”

The signs will operate
on Pearsons buses until at least June 2014. Drivers testing
the signs say they have already seen a change in driver
behaviour, with a notable decrease in the speed at which
motorists pass stationary school buses when the signs are
operational.

Motorists will have a couple of weeks grace
before the police begin to actively enforce the 20km/h speed
limit past stationary school buses, says Sergeant Stephen
Burgerhout of the Police’s Mid/South Canterbury Highway
Patrol.

“As there has been a comprehensive educational
campaign, I will be highly disappointed to see many
offences.”

He says children tend to be impulsive and can
do the unexpected. “If vehicle speeds are lower when
passing stationary school buses, in the event of a child
running out from behind a bus and being hit, the greater
their chance of survival.

“No matter how good a driver a
person is, the more they can do to minimise the factors to
avoid a crash, the better it is for all
involved.”

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